Title
Milliarcsecond Astrometry for the Galilean Moons Using Stellar Occultations
Date Issued
01 January 2022
Access level
open access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Morgado B.E.
Gomes-Júnior A.R.
Braga-Ribas F.
Vieira-Martins R.
Desmars J.
Lainey V.
D'Aversa E.
Dunham D.
Moore J.
Baillié K.
Herald D.
Assafin M.
Sicardy B.
Aoki S.
Bardecker J.
Barton J.
Blank T.
Bruns D.
Carlson N.
Carlson R.W.
Cobble K.
Dunham J.
Eisfeldt D.
Emilio M.
Jacques C.
Hinse T.C.
Kim Y.
Malacarne M.
Maley P.D.
Maury A.
Oliva F.
Orton G.S.
Pereira C.L.
Person M.
Plainaki C.
Sfair R.
Sindoni G.
Smith M.
Sussenbach E.
Stuart P.
Vrolijk J.
Winter O.C.
Publisher(s)
American Astronomical Society
Abstract
A stellar occultation occurs when a Solar System object passes in front of a star for an observer. This technique allows the sizes and shapes of the occulting body to be determined with kilometer precision. In addition, this technique constrains the occulting body's positions, albedos, densities, and so on. In the context of the Galilean moons, these events can provide their best ground-based astrometry, with uncertainties in the order of 1 mas ( 1/43 km at Jupiter's distance during opposition). We organized campaigns and successfully observed a stellar occultation by Io (JI) in 2021, one by Ganymede (JIII) in 2020, and one by Europa (JII) in 2019, with stations in North and South America. We also re-analyzed two previously published events: one by Europa in 2016 and another by Ganymede in 2017. We then fit the known 3D shape of the occulting satellite and determine its center of figure. This resulted in astrometric positions with uncertainties in the milliarcsecond level. The positions obtained from these stellar occultations can be used together with dynamical models to ensure highly accurate orbits of the Galilean moons. These orbits can help when planning future space probes aiming at the Jovian system, such as JUICE by ESA and Europa Clipper by NASA. They also allow more efficient planning of flyby maneuvers.
Volume
163
Issue
5
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Astronomía Meteorología y ciencias atmosféricas Geoquímica, Geofísica Ingeniería ambiental y geológica
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85130073357
Source
Astronomical Journal
ISSN of the container
00046256
Sponsor(s)
This work was carried out within the “Lucky Star” umbrella that agglomerates the efforts of the Paris, Granada, and Rio teams, which is funded by the European Research Council under the European Community's H2020 (ERC grant Agreement No. 669416). This research made use of sora , a python package for stellar occultations reduction and analysis, developed with the support of ERC Lucky Star and LIneA/Brazil, within the collaboration of Rio-Paris-Granada teams. This work has made use of data from the European Space Agency (ESA) mission Gaia ( https://www.cosmos.esa.int/gaia ), processed by the Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC, https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/gaia/dpac/consortium ). Part of this research is supported by INCT do e-Universo, Brazil (CNPQ grants 465376/2014-2). This work was supported by CNES, focused on Juice. Based in part on observations made at the Laboratório Nacional de Astrofísica (LNA), Itajubá-MG, Brazil. The following authors acknowledge the respective (i) CNPq grants: B.E.M 150612/2020-6; F.B.-R. 314772/2020-0; R.V.-M. 304544/2017-5, 401903/2016-8; M.A. 427700/2018-3, 310683/2017-3, 473002/2013-2; R.S. and O.C.W. 305210/2018-1. (ii) CAPES/Cofecub grant: B.E.M. 394/2016-05. (ii) FAPERJ grants: M.A. E-26/111.488/2013. (iii) FAPESP grants: A.R.G.Jr. 2018/11239-8; R.S. and O.C.W. 2016/24561-0. The Italian coauthors thank ASI and INAF for the financial support through the “Accordo ASI-INAF n. 2018-25-HH.0”. The Infrared Telescope Facility is operated by the University of Hawaii under contract NNH14CK55B with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. We express special thanks to Bobby Bus as support astronomer for IRTF observations. The Sobaeksan Observatory facility SOAO is managed by the Korean Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI). A portion of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004). T.C.H. and Y.K. would like to thank the staff at the SOAO observatory for fruitful discussions on astronomical data presented in this paper. R.S. acknowledges support by the DFG German Research Foundation project 446102036. R.S. and O.C.W. thanks the Brazilian Federal Agency for Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education (CAPES), in the scope of the Program CAPES-PrInt, process number 88887.310463/2018-00, International Cooperation Project number 3266. This research received financial support from the National Research Foundation (NRF; No. 2019R1I1A1A01059609). This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior—Brasil (CAPES) - Finance Code 001.
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Comisión Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo Aeroespacial Scopus